New Delhi: Millions of Indians know Jana Gana Mana as the country’s national anthem, a song heard at schools, Parliament, sporting events and official ceremonies. Its words are part of everyday public life in India. It symbolises the country’s unity and national identity across generations.
President-elect Rajendra Prasad announced that the composition consisting of its words and music would be India’s national anthem, while Vande Mataram, which had played a historic role in the freedom struggle, would receive equal honour as the national song. The occasion was only weeks after King George V had arrived in India for the Delhi Durbar, where he was proclaimed Emperor of India. That timing would later fuel the suspicion that Tagore had written the song for the British monarch.
It was first sung on December 27, 1911, at the Calcutta session of the Indian National Congress. The Constituent Assembly formally adopted Jana Gana Mana on January 24, 1950.
But reports in the Indian press distinguished Tagore’s composition from a separate song that was actually sung in praise of George V. The official Congress account also recorded that a patriotic song by him was followed by a resolution expressing loyalty to the King, after which a separate song welcoming George V and Queen Mary was performed. That distinction is important. The Congress session was held when the British monarch was receiving public attention. Tagore’s explanation left little room for ambiguity.
Two different songs were therefore remembered together, helping create the impression that Tagore’s Jana Gana Mana was a royal tribute. In a 1937 letter to his close associate Pulin Bihari Sen, he explained that a senior official in the British administration, who was also his friend, had asked him to write a song welcoming the Emperor.
The request, he said, had left him disturbed. He responded by composing “Jana Gana Mana” in praise of the “Bharata Bhagya Vidhata” (the dispenser of India’s destiny). He said that this eternal guide, who had guided India’s journey through ages of rise and fall, could not be George V, George VI or any other George.
